THE Government must do whatever it can to help rescue the strategically vital steel industry, but Business Secretary Sajid Javid’s plans to slash steelworkers’ pensions are reprehensible and irresponsible.

The Tata-sponsored £13.5billion British Steel Pension Scheme has a £700million deficit and potential rescuers of the firm’s UK steel operations have made it clear that they will not take on responsibility for it. As a result, the scheme has been called a “poison pill”. To get rid of this, Javid is looking at changing the law so that the scheme trustees and Tata can drastically cut members’ benefits without any consultation.

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He claims that the changes would only apply to the BSPS, but if he truly believes this then he is delusional. Due to quantitative easing and rock-bottom interest rates, almost every defined benefit pension fund in the UK has seen its liabilities rocket. If Javid’s Tata pensions plan succeeds, every company that sponsors a DB pension plan will instruct their lawyers to find a way so that they can also take advantage.

That means the pensions of millions of workers would be at risk. He needs to find another way to help the steel industry as destroying the retirement benefits of millions is not the way to do it. Our pensions system is built around the promise that once benefits have been accrued, they cannot be touched. Every government has stood behind that pledge unflinchingly, until now. Javid should be ashamed of himself for even contemplating this.

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GETTY

The Tata-sponsored £13.5billion British Steel Pension Scheme has a £700million deficit

Like millions of others, sadly I am a customer of the train operator Govia Thameslink Railway, which is despised by passengers for the constant delays and regular service cancellations. After nearly two years of bungling, you would be forgiven for thinking that the Department for Transport would fire GTR and revoke their franchises for constantly missing their targets. Instead, the DfT has made their targets easier to hit. Heads at both the DfT and GTR need to roll.